Posted
by
kdawson
on Wednesday April 14, 2010 @03:53AM
from the arrrr-eh dept.

wasme writes "The Pirate Party of Canada has become the first Pirate Party outside of Europe to become an official political party. Elections Canada confirmed with the party that the PPCA has gained 'eligible for registration' status, and can run in elections starting June 14. From the PPCA's official announcement: 'We are pleased to announce that as of April 12, 2010, the Pirate Party of Canada is officially eligible for Party Status. After 10 months of dedication and hard work, we have reached eligible status, which only leaves a 60-day "purgatory" period. After that, we will field candidates in subsequent federal elections, and begin the real work of a political party.'"

If everyone who has ever used the Internet to obtain an unrestricted digital copy of music or a movie is going to be labeled "pirate", then I don't have any reason to avoid the term. The term has already lost all meaning.

I was born in the U.S., I purchased DVDs while living there. Now to watch what I've purchased, I'm a "pirate".

Except for the fact that actual piracy on the high seas, with weapons, kidnapping and extortion is on the rise off the coast of Somalia. So yeah, it's not as cute to call yourself a pirate these days, as it was when it was a quaint thing of the past.

Mod parent up. Piracy (as in people boarding ships to ransack the cargo or kidnap the crew) has never ceased, it was simply marginalised to third-world regions where it did not affect "our" trade and therefore seldom made it into the news.

Your rather eloquent expression of the invalid conflation between egregious breaches of social morality and insignificantly trivial breaches of consumer behavior is misplaced.I think what you mean to say is "ARRRR!"

Your rather eloquent expression of the invalid conflation between egregious breaches of social morality and insignificantly trivial breaches of consumer behavior is misplaced.I think what you mean to say is "ARRRR! Eh!"

it was the content industries of the US that deliberately and forcefully changed the meaning of pirate from "pirate of the high seas" to "software pirate" to "copyright infringement pirate". This was done via putting it in the news constantly. Pirate this, pirate that. So it's very appropriate to have a name that is a direct reminder of what they are up against.

The smart folks understand this has nothing to do with Somalia, although if it does bring attention to that, it would be a good thing. People need t

In most other nations ( other than the U.S. ) the significance of a ballot label's "imagery" can be limited by the ability of a political party to enforce party platforms.

In the U.S.(in general) the name of a political party is just a ballot label, and any individual politician can run under it in a primary (nominating) election. In most other democratic nations, a political party is a private member based organization that "owns" a ballot label and chooses politicians to run

And it's a hi (hey) ho (hey) coming down the plains,Stealing wheat and barley, and all the other grains.And it's a ho (hey) hi (hey) Farmers bar your doors,when you see the Jolly Rodger on Regina's mighty shores.--------

But seriously, great news, and best of luck to 'em. Now go get those CRIA hosers.

They call it theft for reasons that are quite clearly subliminalIn order to support a business model that's primordialInfringement is a civil matter, extortion is criminalBut they push legislation that will kill our highway digitalAnd so we need a party that will argue antitheticalIn order to preserve our freedoms we hold indispensableSo I say welcome to the party that is dubbed piraticalYou'll get my vote election time lest Bob Rae joins your ensemble!

I used to be a farmer, and I made a living fine,
I had a little stretch of land along the CP line
But times were hard and though I tried, the money wasn't there
And the bankers came and took my land and told me "fair is fair"

I looked for every kind of job, the answer always no
"Hire you now?" they'd alway

Have there been any reactions from Big Media / Big Patents to this?... How do they swallow the fact that the Pirate Parties are now taking a legal and official route to copyright reform?

I'm thinking they'll just shrug their shoulders. They'll probably make a little money from this, by running human interest stories about the new "joke party" that started up. And they wouldn't be too far off the mark in calling it a joke party, either.

I can't say if I am for or against the ACTA . . . because I don't know the details.

I don't have to know ANY of the details to be against it -- why would they keep it a secret if they thought it was benign? There are media companies and governments, NO input from citizens, and "my" representatives are keeping it secret from me. What's not to hate?

Yeah, many people amongst pirate parties feel that way too. But first, we think that the "second-degreeness" of the name is good and is a way to ridicule this "pirate" label that lobbyists are trying to give to people who just share files. There has already been some reaction (from the RIAA IIRC). They said that "pirate" was a bad term because it sounded "too cool" and that they needed to come out with a new term to qualify their enemies. We proposed "filesharers" but apparently that is not what they are looking for.

How would changing the name to the "Privacy Party" be relevant? If it's not the exact opposite of what the party stands for, it's at least highly tangential. The Pirate Party stands for sharing information, not privacy.

How would changing the name to the "Privacy Party" be relevant? If it's not the exact opposite of what the party stands for, it's at least highly tangential. The Pirate Party stands for sharing information, not privacy.

Have you actually looked at our policies? At least here in the UK rolling back surveillance & defending individual privacy is part of our platform. Just look at the three bullet points on our front page: http://www.pirateparty.org.uk/ [pirateparty.org.uk]

At least here in the UK rolling back surveillance & defending individual privacy is part of our platform. Just look at the three bullet points on our front page: http://www.pirateparty.org.uk/ [pirateparty.org.uk]

OK, so that seems a bit schizophrenic. You want to increase privacy, but also want to "let information be free" in terms of allowing sharing of information. But increased privacy is the opposite of sharing information, it's increased control over it.

OK, so that seems a bit schizophrenic. You want to increase privacy, but also want to "let information be free" in terms of allowing sharing of information. But increased privacy is the opposite of sharing information, it's increased control over it.

Wrong right. You confuse copyright — the exclusive right of publishers to copy a work (which is never physically enforcable) — with the author’s right — the right of a creator of a work, to get something in return for it (which in the US conveniently has little or no meaning).

Copyright was never about the ones who thought up the whole thing. But about those who wanted to be their liege lords. Something that is completely obsolete nowadays.

Wrong right. You confuse copyright — the exclusive right of publishers to copy a work (which is never physically enforcable) — with the author’s right — the right of a creator of a work, to get something in return for it.

It's the same thing. There is no author's right without copyright. Only through control of the publishing chain will the concept of an author's right make any sense.

If there is no copyright then the only way to keep someone from publishing your works is to not publish them yourself.

Copyright was originally intended to give an economic incentive to the creation of cultural works. By granting the author (or the party the author has transferred the copyright of the work to) a temporary monopoly on copying said

Why? Copyrights exist to promote the public interest by encouraging authors to create and publish works that they otherwise would not create and publish, while minimally restricting the public in terms of both the scope of protection and the duration during which the works are protected.

A perpetual right is not only unconstitutional (the Constitution requires that copyrights be granted only for a limited time), but clearly cannot ever promote the public interest precisely because it is perpetual. Further, f

No. That is your and some American forefather's interpretation of why the copyright exists.

Well, that's good company to be in. Of course, it is also the reasoning of the British, when they created what we think of as copyright, even earlier in the 18th century. And it's been the opinion of at least the US courts up to the present day. And, frankly, it's the only reason that is compatible with the idea of a natural right of free speech.

In other countries, the right to be recognized as an Author of a work is

Another Canadian political party siphoning off left-leaning voters. Already that vote is split between Liberal, NDP, Green, and (some would argue) the Bloc. This vote split is why the conservatives can continue to hold political power with 38% of the popular vote.

In political systems with fully proportional representation (example: Israel) these sorts of political parties make sense: the hurdle to get representation in the legislature is surmountable and you may even be brought into a coalition government. However, in first-past-the-post systems (Canada, US, UK) these vanity parties are only self-defeating. Whichever side of the political spectrum is best able to AVOID this fragmentation is almost guaranteed power. To use a Canadian example, look at the solid Liberal control in the 90s, made easy by a 3-way fragmentation on the right (the old PC party, Reform, and Alliance). Once those parties re-coalesced into the current Conservative party they were able to take over from the perpetually fragmented left.

If you have a particular issue that you want to advance in a first-past-the-post democracy, the correct move is to identify which of the major parties is most receptive to your goal, and organize within that party. Form an organization, raise money, make noise. If you're a visible constituency within a major party (and can be counted on to bring in votes, donations, and volunteers) then they will have reason to differentiate themselves by embracing your issue.

If instead your constituency says "ha! We're going to take our votes and make our own damn party" then BOTH major parties will simply say "ok, no need to listen to care what those guys want -- they're not going to vote for us anyway". You're only making copyright reform HARDER to achieve.

I can't speak for Canada, but "Voting for the lesser evil so that 'The Other Guy(tm)' doesn't get elected" is half the reason the US political system is the shithole it is right now. Nothing saddens me quite like people dredging up this tired old line to oppose the formation of new political parties, and getting modded up for their trouble.

That's why I always support Cthulhu for President: Why vote for the lesser evil?

But more seriously, while the "lesser evil" argument isn't entirely valid, bear in mind that if 50% of Nader voters had voted for Gore in 2000, Gore would have won easily and the debacle that was the George W Bush administration would never have happened. So there is a good argument for "vote for the lesser evil" when it's a close election between completely evil and not-so-completely evil, and "vote for what you really want" wh

Your argument is the exact same one I hear all the time in the USA, when it comes to the Libertarians. (In fact, the man most people probably consider the quintessential Libertarian figure today -- Ron Paul? He's run on the Republican party ticket since the mid 1970's!)

The problem with the entrenched 2-party system is, the 2 parties tend to align themselves with certain "goals" they want to achieve. Individuals signing up to run under one of their party names who have different ideas quickly get marginali

What we need is a party to split the right. I would be happier to see a pro-intellectual property, family values, pry gun from cold dead hands, anti-abortion, anti-gay rights party announce, something that could siphon votes away from the Conservatives.

I'm all for this, but based on my "admittedly limited" exposure, it seems that the only issues that the Pirate Party have ever really talked about much are copyright issues. No qualms there, I'm all for that, but do they have an official stance on anything OTHER than copyright?

Some of The Pirate Parties' main points are: Defend the right to privacy and personal correspondence, less surveillance, shorten copyright, abolish patents, remove laws against reverse engineering, promote open source software, ensure net neutrality, stronger laws against plagiarism, ensure due process in all cases, and much more.
Basically, to use a cliché, The Pirate Parties exist to steer the world away from 1984, as far away as possible.

As a Swedish pirate, the swedish pirate party Piratpartiet is the one I know best. Here gun control is not an issue. Pretty much everyone agrees that more guns is bad and less guns is good. I know that that's kind of opposite to the American view but anyway, that not a pirate party question here.

We explicitly don't take stand in most questions because it will only split the movement and make it weaker. Our issues are VERY important to us and our stand in them are WAY different from the established partie

However ideal the agenda of the party might actually be, the term 'pirate' is very heavily associated with anarchy and activities that involve breaking the law, rather than the far more positive notion of working within the legal system to effect the potentially revolutionary changes that the Pirate Party wishes to advocate. Unfortunately, people who have never heard of them will take one look at the name and judge the party based on that, rather than investigate what their actual platforms are. Without a name change, they don't have a hope in hell of making a difference. They are likely going to be taken about as seriously as the Rhino Party.

He compares the PP to the International Socialist Org. I think his *real* problem is that he's rabidly against all that even slightly fetters corporate power due to his blind hatred of anything that smells like socialism. I wonder if he can spell "McCarthyism".

It's called the "golden rule" - he who has the gold, makes the rules. From where I'm sitting, corporations have most of the gold, and there sure are a lot of laws being made in their favour at the moment.

Plus, corporations may not form government, but they sure do field people who form government - Halliburton anyone?

I want to add the crucial detail of it saying “gold”. Not “dollars”. This is intentional.The whole economic crisis didn’t happen for those, who had their money in gold. Its value remained stable. Or in other words: Rose dramatically compared to the dollar.Now they just have to sell it, to buy that cheap cheap dollar, and they have extreme profits, bought with our labor.Now guess who had the gold during that time... yup, the very people that caused it in the first place.

The different pirate parties don't all work the same. I see it as a generic name for the concept, just like there's a "Communist Party" or "Conservative Party" in multiple countries. They may agree on the basics between themselves, but don't necessarily actively cooperate or agree on the specifics.

The different pirate parties do disagree on things like how long copyright should last. There's a general agreement that the current length is too long, but the swedish one wants 5 years, while there are others that would be fine with 20.

We have a Communist Party in Canada, and have had one for a long time. This hasn't caused any problems. We also have a "Rhino" party, (or did for many years, anyway.)

When you have a multi-party system representing many voices, then what you are talking about becomes a strength rather than a problem. The more populous voices heard on the floor of the House of Commons, the better. At least in an ideal world, which we clearly do not have.

Is that even a real word? Sounds like something made up by political lunatics in the US. Anyway, I'm not replying to insult you, IIRC you're a sane person judging from past posts, but I really don't get this (very US-specific) fear of other nations.

> But what worries me about the Pirate Party is precisely that it is fundamentally international in nature.

How can that possibly be a bad thing? Sure, a lot of things (location of a new city park or speed regulations) should naturally be

Spreading BS like "The goals of the party are essentially dictated centrally from Sweden and then implemented throughout the world wherever the PP has any power to do so." is very irresponsible, please stop that.

But what worries me about the Pirate Party is precisely that it is fundamentally international in nature.

What worries me is that many political parties which should be international in nature pretend to be merely local. For example, the UK's Official Monster Raving Loony Party http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Official_Monster_Raving_Loony_Party [wikipedia.org] should expand internationally. Entry by the OMRLP into US politics could be disastrous for both the Republicans and the Democrats, since the policies of all three parties would be so closely clustered (on the sanity scale).

I think you bit off a bit too much rhetoric there, and that your worries are founded on air.

...the formation of international parties (much like the well known International Socialist Organization) bodes ill for countries on an individual basis

I won't take your word for it, and I expect you to thank me for it. Evidence please. That is, evidence of your main point, not evidence regarding the incidental ISO.

I could imagine that international parties are scrutinized more closely so that the people who make up their rank are not dabbling buffoons, but rather competent citizens with a clear sense of both ideals and morals. In the case of political pirate parti

The Swedish Pirate Party has no power whatsoever over pirate parties in other countries. The moment the German pirate party, for example, feel that the Swedes have gone too far, they can just ignore them and go their own way.

It's actually common that European political parties have "sister parties" in other countries. The Christian Democrats exist in many European countries, as well as Green parties, and Liberal parties. It's not comparable to the International Socialist Organization.

If you're going to limit the naming of your party to "things Americans don't shoot at", you're seriously limiting yourself, slippery. "Democrats" and "Republicans" is right out the window for instance ; ).

Why does it matter when a) they've been elected to the European Parliament and b) even the copyright lobby belives it's a "cool" name? It would be a near political suicide to try to change the name. There was a short lived "information society party" in Finland but that didn't go anywhere.

i agree, pirate party is a retarded immature name. these clowns undermine serious copyright reform.

These "clowns" are actually running for political office and working from within the democratic system. If nothing else, the fact that they're acknowledged as a legitimate political party gives them access to a lot of extra soapboxes. TV interviews, debates, questions, these all serve to raise awareness about privacy concerns and governments selling out to big media.

So what have you done lately to promote serious copyright reform? And no, bitching about it on Slashdot does not count.

I'm confused, I though being a "clown" was a requirement to be a politician. So I the way I understood the parent post was that it was saying the members of this party were perfectly suited for political office.

Heck, they can't be any worse then Jack Latyon, Steven Haper or Michael Ignatieff (the three stooges). I can't trust any of them or their parties, none of them ever tell the truth or stick to campaign promises (Not that I'd expect a politician to be honest). It's always a toss up when I'm voting beca

Many countries (including Finland for example) have a cassette tax (which applies to CD's etc), but still have strict copyright laws. Besides, pirate parties have a broad range of issues from civil liberties to privacy, patents etc. Copyright is only a rather small part of our agenda.

Political campaigning for rights in the digital domain is a "good thing".

I agree. However, forming single-issue political parties is generally a "bad thing". Pushing as hard as you can on a single issue and ignoring the rest of the world is ok when you are a non-governmental pressure group but not when your goal is to be in the government. If you think that is unrealistic in case of the pirate parties, take a look at crazy coalitions in some European countries where parties with 0.5% of the vote are actua

I agree. However, forming single-issue political parties is generally a "bad thing". Pushing as hard as you can on a single issue and ignoring the rest of the world is ok when you are a non-governmental pressure group but not when your goal is to be in the government.

Who says their goal is to be in government?
Besides, the fact is, the PP in Sweden has succeeded rather well in both gaining lots of attention for the issues, and largely forced the hand of the established parties to start listening to people on copyright/IP issues. Across the board. The result is that Sweden is now one of the EU's biggest champions when it comes to advocating common-sense on these issues. (for instance, they've already made it quite clear they won't sign ACTA the way it looks at the moment).

take a look at crazy coalitions in some European countries where parties with 0.5% of the vote are actually represented in the government

Hyperbole. Which European country has parliamentary representation for a party with 0.5% of the vote? Usually the cutoff to get a seat in parliament is 3-4%.

..and able to influence things way beyond their mandate since their limited platform allows them to trade support on all kinds of issues in exchange for their favorite issue.

So? If all people care about is one issue, to the extent that they're prepared to vote for a single-issue party, then why shouldn't that count for something? It's up to the other parties to decide if they want to compromise in exchange for support or not. If anyone should be criticized it's them.

The entire premise of forming a political party is to be in government. Why else would you do such a thing? It amounts to an act of fraud on the citizens to form a political party without aiming to govern.

The entire premise of forming a political party is to be in government. Why else would you do such a thing? It amounts to an act of fraud on the citizens to form a political party without aiming to govern.

You're confusing governing with being in government.
You don't have to be in the government (have cabinet posts, i.e. control the executive branch) to govern. You still have full legislative influence by being in parliament.
For instance, the Swedish Greens have never been in government, but have succeeded in influencing lots of legislation. To make an analogy to US politics, what you're saying is akin to it being dishonest to run for Congress if you have no intention of seeking the Presidency.

It's not necessarily the case that a small, single-issue party can maximize their influence by being part of government, since that would force them to ally themselves with a political block. It would also force them to shoulder political responsibility for the government's policies, even when outside their sphere of interest, something which could risk dividing their membership.

I think there may be a slight confusion in terms here - in English-speaking countries, "government" is often used to refer to the state as a whole. In that sense, the entire parliament and all authorities are part of the government.

In Sweden, the word is used in a stricter sense; only the executive organ is referred to as "government". The rest is referred to simply as "the state".

The entire premise of forming a political party is to be in government. Why else would you do such a thing? It amounts to an act of fraud on the citizens to form a political party without aiming to govern.

Here in the UK, the Green Party has never been elected to a seat in Parliament, however just by standing and taking votes from the other parties they have managed to get their platform onto the agenda of the main parties - they've essentially won the argument. If the PPUK can emulate that, we'd consider it a success. I mean, we're just about to fight our first election, under a year after we formed; we're only standing in 10 seats out of the ~650 or so that there are. Even if we won all 10 seats we couldn't

Canada doesn't have a proportional system so it's not as much of a problem there.

We instead have the problem where if you have less than 15% of the vote, unless you're a single issue party dedicated to one region like the Bloc, you have no power at all (see: Green party). I prefer having actual democracy to cycling back and forth between two major parties as soon as the current one does too many things you don't like.

And on top of that it's all sounding highly opportunistic, good chance that the people in these parties prove poor politicians I have seen that happening in The Netherlands around the party founded by the late late Pim Fortuyn - the result was a lot of infighting and five, six parliamentary elections in 8 years time. His party gained some 15-20% or so of the votes, out of nothing. By then we had had the murder of Mr Fortuyn already and the party started to resemble a wrestling ring more t

Personally I think we should get rid of parties altogether. The problem is you vote for a person, if that person belongs to a party they're going to vote the way the party tells them to regardless of how it hurts the area they're from. If they don't, they get booted out of caucus, lose the political party funding and have to sit as an independent (see Bill Casey and the Atlantic accord [wikipedia.org]).